Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1887-01-23

"She slept an hour or more, only stir
ring once TO raise her head a trIfie on my
shoulder and curl her fingers up in my
hand, and, upon my word, was rather
sorry when she opened her eyes At last
She opened them pretty widely, too, and
blushed nightly at first, and looked rather
confused, and said she had been so sleepy
she hadn't kn0wn-and then we both
fairly laughed outright.
But she grew grave again, quickly,
when she found it was close to IL o'clock,
with twenty miles to cover yet. Ben
would surely have given her up and gone
back. What should she do?
"Of course, | told her that she
needn't feel alarmed-that | would take
her TO hotel where she would be per-
fectly safe, and would send word to her
people IN the morning or drive her out N.Y.
self.
But she mad never stayed at hotel
alone and didn't like the idea, it was
evident; and she had heard so many
stories about thieves, and-and she had
some money-a good deal of money-$50!
that belonged to papa; ana she was
frightened. Now, always carried plenty
of money with me on my trips-l had
about $500 in my fob then-and had never
yet lost a dollar, and L quietly laughed at
ner fears. And then, to reasure her,
told her of little dodge of my own,
which she might try. This was. before
going to bed, to place the bulk of her
money in one of her shoes and leave only
some small sum in her pocketbOOk.
Then if thief should happen into the
room he would simply take the book,
and, thinking he had secured all, walk of,
! content
"She smiled atthis. and then to get her
mind away from the subject | showed her
the pictures of my boy and girl. They
are pretty children and | am very proud
| OF them; and she admired them vastly
and wished that she had them in her Sun
day school class, and hoped that some day
| might bring them to see her, for her
| papa would be very glad to see me if
came that way. And so at length we ran
into the Allentown depot, and for one
was only half glad.
Her brother Ben was there after all on
the platform, and thanked me quite
warmly for looking after his sister. An
| ordinary looking young fellow--reminding
me little, though, thought, OF some
face l had seen recently, couldn't recall
| where.
said he had put up his horse, as the
road was too bad to be driven back over
that night, and he and his sister would
stay in town until morning. SO we climbed
into hotel bus and rode up together as
| socially as you please.
AC ilbblC xiii w ab tllCUs vi COuIB6, anu
| went to her room at once when we
reached the house, and her brother fol-
| lowed suit before long; but first he in
vited me very cordially to visit them the
next day. And then, when had finished
supper and smoked a cigar, l too went off
| TO bed.
81 locked my door, of course, and tried
to bolt it, but. as luck would have it, that
bolt wouldn't shoot. Something was
| Snel-ot .
troubled me very little. As usual, | left
a few dollars in my pOckeiboOk, stuffed
the rest of my money into one OF my boots
and threw them down carelessly by nv
bed and turned in.
"The porter was hammering at the
door, and 1t was broad daylight when
woke up. turned over and yawned and
then | noticed that the door was Jar.
WAS out of bed in an instant. The key
was still in the keyhole; but it had been
turned. lipeeped out, but the porter had
gone and the entry was empty Then |
trod on my pOcketb0ok-and that was
empty, too. And my watch was missing,
and my diamond pin and gold pencil case.
Even my sleeve buttons had disappeared,
and my cuffs lay on the floor.
II was pretty angry man, you may
| believe, but took up my boots, sure, at all
events. OF that roll of bills | had hidden
so cieverly. NV young friend, those boots
were empty too. L had been com pletely
| cleaned out.
"Well, l hunted up the landlord, and a
| detective was sent for. 1t was quite
evident that the thief had turned
my key with nippers, and known MS
business well. The ques ton was if he
was still in the house. and if others had
suffered as well as |. And that made
me think of my little friend and her
s50-and then very ugly thought struck
| me: